The background description provided herein is for the purpose of generally presenting the context of the disclosure. Work of the presently named inventors, to the extent it is described in this background section, as well as aspects of the description that may not otherwise qualify as prior art at the time of filing, are neither expressly nor impliedly admitted as prior art against the present disclosure.
Today, a wide variety of computing devices, including portable devices such as mobile phones and hand-held global positioning system (GPS) units, support software applications that display interactive digital maps. Many of these computing devices are equipped with a touchscreen via which users may interact with the digital maps. For example, a user may “drag” the viewport to a new location, double-tap to zoom in on a location, etc. Further, the user may submit a geographic search query and, in response, the software application may place selectable markers at locations on the digital map corresponding to the results of the search query. The user then may tap on the marker to view additional information pertaining to the location.
However, because screen real estate may be limited (particularly in portable devices), the software application may display multiple markers so closely together on the touchscreen that it is difficult for the user to accurately select the desired marker with his or her finger. In particular, the area of contact with the user's finger may include several markers, and the software application cannot determine with certainty which of the several markers the user intended to select. Although the software application may, for example, determine the centroid of the contact area and select the marker closest to the centroid, the marker selected in this manner is not always the one the user intended to select.